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Increase IOPS and throughput limits for Azure Premium SSDs and Standard SSD/HDDs

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The Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS) and throughput limits for Azure Premium solid-state drives (SSD), Standard SSDs, and Standard hard disk drives (HDD) that are 513 GiB and larger can be increased by enabling performance plus. Enabling performance plus improves the experience for workloads that require high IOPS and throughput, such as database and transactional workloads. There's no extra charge for enabling performance plus on a disk.

Once enabled, the IOPS and throughput limits for an eligible disk increase to the higher maximum limits. To see the new IOPS and throughput limits for eligible disks, consult the columns that begin with "*Expanded" in the Scalability and performance targets for VM disks article.

Limitations

  • Can only be enabled on Standard HDD, Standard SSD, and Premium SSD managed disks that are 513 GiB or larger
  • Can only be enabled on new disks
    • To work around this, create a snapshot of your disk, then create a new disk from the snapshot
  • Not supported for disks recovered with Azure Site Recovery

Prerequisites

Either use the Azure Cloud Shell to run your commands or install a version of the Azure PowerShell module 9.5 or newer, or a version of the Azure CLI that is 2.44.0 or newer.

Enable performance plus

You need to create a new disk to use performance plus. The following scripts show how to create a disk with performance plus enabled and, if desired, attach it to a VM. The commands have been organized into self-contained steps for reliability.

Create a resource group

This step creates a resource group with a unique name.

export RANDOM_SUFFIX=$(openssl rand -hex 3)
export MY_RG="PerfPlusRG$RANDOM_SUFFIX"
export REGION="WestUS2"
az group create -g $MY_RG -l $REGION

Results:

{
  "id": "/subscriptions/xxxxx/resourceGroups/PerfPlusRGxxx",
  "location": "WestUS2",
  "name": "PerfPlusRGxxx",
  "properties": {
    "provisioningState": "Succeeded"
  }
}

Create a new disk with performance plus enabled

This step creates a new disk of 513 GiB (or larger) with performance plus enabled using a valid SKU value.

export MY_DISK="PerfPlusDisk$RANDOM_SUFFIX"
export SKU="Premium_LRS"
export DISK_SIZE=513
az disk create -g $MY_RG -n $MY_DISK --size-gb $DISK_SIZE --sku $SKU -l $REGION --performance-plus true

Results:

{
  "id": "/subscriptions/xxxxx/resourceGroups/PerfPlusRGxxx/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/PerfPlusDiskxxx",
  "location": "WestUS2",
  "name": "PerfPlusDiskxxx",
  "properties": {
    "provisioningState": "Succeeded",
    "diskSizeGb": 513,
    "sku": "Premium_LRS",
    "performancePlus": true
  },
  "type": "Microsoft.Compute/disks"
}

Attempt to attach the disk to a VM

This optional step attempts to attach the disk to an existing VM. It first checks if the VM exists and then proceeds accordingly.

export MY_VM="NonExistentVM"
if az vm show -g $MY_RG -n $MY_VM --query "name" --output tsv >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    az vm disk attach --vm-name $MY_VM --name $MY_DISK --resource-group $MY_RG 
else
    echo "VM $MY_VM not found. Skipping disk attachment."
fi

Results:

VM NonExistentVM not found. Skipping disk attachment.

Create a new disk from an existing disk or snapshot with performance plus enabled

This series of steps creates a separate resource group and then creates a new disk from an existing disk or snapshot. Replace the SOURCE_URI with a valid source blob URI that belongs to the same region (WestUS2) as the disk.

Create a resource group for migration

export RANDOM_SUFFIX=$(openssl rand -hex 3)
export MY_MIG_RG="PerfPlusMigrRG$RANDOM_SUFFIX"
export REGION="WestUS2"
az group create -g $MY_MIG_RG -l $REGION

Results:

{
  "id": "/subscriptions/xxxxx/resourceGroups/PerfPlusMigrRGxxx",
  "location": "WestUS2",
  "name": "PerfPlusMigrRGxxx",
  "properties": {
    "provisioningState": "Succeeded"
  }
}

Create the disk from an existing snapshot or disk

# Create a snapshot from the original disk
export MY_SNAPSHOT_NAME="PerfPlusSnapshot$RANDOM_SUFFIX"
echo "Creating snapshot from original disk..."
az snapshot create \
  --name $MY_SNAPSHOT_NAME \
  --resource-group $MY_RG \
  --source $MY_DISK

# Get the snapshot ID for use as source
SNAPSHOT_ID=$(az snapshot show \
  --name $MY_SNAPSHOT_NAME \
  --resource-group $MY_RG \
  --query id \
  --output tsv)

echo "Using snapshot ID: $SNAPSHOT_ID"

# Create the new disk using the snapshot as source
export MY_MIG_DISK="PerfPlusMigrDisk$RANDOM_SUFFIX"
export SKU="Premium_LRS"
export DISK_SIZE=513

az disk create \
  --name $MY_MIG_DISK \
  --resource-group $MY_MIG_RG \
  --size-gb $DISK_SIZE \
  --performance-plus true \
  --sku $SKU \
  --source $SNAPSHOT_ID \
  --location $REGION

Results:

{
  "id": "/subscriptions/xxxxx/resourceGroups/PerfPlusMigrRGxxx/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/PerfPlusMigrDiskxxx",
  "location": "WestUS2",
  "name": "PerfPlusMigrDiskxxx",
  "properties": {
    "provisioningState": "Succeeded",
    "diskSizeGb": 513,
    "sku": "Premium_LRS",
    "performancePlus": true,
    "source": "https://examplestorageaccount.blob.core.windows.net/snapshots/sample-westus2.vhd"
  },
  "type": "Microsoft.Compute/disks"
}